| Research shows that about 35% of American children ages 6 to 17 are overweight or obese. To blame are the familiar culprits of too little physical activity and too many empty calories. But there may be another personal reason to blame: the parents who don’t believe their kids are overweight.
According to the C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital National Poll on Children’s Health, more than 40% of parents with obese children between 6 and 11 years old described them as “about the right weight.” And only 13% of parents thought their children were very overweight. That’s a scary statistic. All of those parents who think their kids are “big boned” or “comfortably healthy” or “will grow out of it” should consider scheduling an appointment at their pediatrician’s office and take a 5-minute course in thoroughly understanding the body mass index and its importance to their child’s health. The doctor can easily highlight on the BMI chart the child’s sex, age and corresponding body mass range. Simple put “overweight” means that the child has a body mass index above the 95th percentile for his/her age, and a body mass index that is above the 85th percentile for the child’s age puts him/her at risk of becoming overweight. (If your child is in the 85th percentile it means that compared with children of the same sex and age, 85% have a lower body mass index.) Both of these percentile ranges should put the parents on red and orange alerts respectively.
The problem with parents who fail to recognize their children are overweight tend to avoid helping them with healthier eating choices and encouraging them to incorporate more physical activity in their lifestyle. Wake up folks. -- PC
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